“Nice and slow, yes?” says a voice I instantly recognize.
Anger flares inside me, debilitating and all-encompassing, knowing who that voice belongs to, and knowing I’ve weakened myself by being so focused on Sephania for the past few hours.
Somehow this bastard managed to tail me.
With a twitch of my wrists, shadows curl around the protruding arm, lightly lifting the blade away from my neck.
I leap back, swinging out from the alley, and draw my saber. It glints in the night, reflecting moonlight.
Lukain Mortis stands ten feet away, cutting through my shadow. “You’ve gotten stronger since we last fought, Skartovius. Since you’ve tasted Sephania.”
“Of course I have, fool.” I bare my fangs at him. I could kill Lukain—could wrap him in my shadows and render him defenseless.
But I know if Sephania discovers it, she would flay me. It would ruin her, as much as I wish it weren’t the case.
Until I can make sure Sephania realizes the error of trusting a bastard like this, I can do him no harm. Not for his sake, but for hers.
“So have I,” Lukain says. His eyes shimmer.
“Is this the part where you show me whatever power Sephania unlocked inside you?” I muse, striking a stance.
“No. I’m not here to fight you, Skartovius.”
“Then why are you here.Howare you—”
“I didn’t know where else to go. Come, follow me.”
I scoff. “Fuck that. Who do you think I am, to trust you?”
“There’s no time, you madman! You think if I wanted you dead, I wouldn’t have just speared my sword through your neck when you poked it out of the alley?”
He jogs away angrily.
Begrudgingly, cautiously, I follow him.
In a nearby alley, Lukain emerges . . . with a small human carried in his arms. Her head is drooped over one side, her knees bent at the other. I recognize her instantly as Sephania’s friend.
But there’s something awfully wrong. The pale tint of her skin, the sleek rubbery texture—she’s no human at all.
I grit my teeth angrily.
“I had to turn her, Skartovius. She isn’t through the process. But I can’t keep her. Alacine wishes her dead—believesshe’s dead. This was all I could think to do.”
I notice a plea in Lukain’s eyes when I study him. I can tell he’s speaking truthfully, as baffling as it is. “What am I supposed to do with her?” I ask, wrinkling my nose.
“See that she’s safe. Reunite her with Sephania. It will make her happy to see a friend.” He lifts his arms forward, urging me to take her.
I growl, “And it will endear her to you even more when she finds out this is your doing, saving her friend.”
Hope shines in his eyes when I say the words “even more,” and I curse myself for letting them out. For all Lukain knew, Sephania was finished with him.
His expression quickly darkens with anger. “Then tell her nothing of my doing. This isn’t about us, you arrogant bastard.”
Lukain’s words hang in the air.
I cautiously sheathe my sword and reach my arms out, stepping forward skeptically—distrusting and unwilling to be outsmarted by this half-blood fiend.
Lukain drops the light interfolk girl in my arms. She looks horrible, halfway to dead, and that’s because she is. There’s a great slash across her neck. It pains me, knowing Sephania canand willheal such a wound, weakening my beloved.
